Lecturers run amok
The UCU union congress erupted in an argument when delegates dared to challenge their leadership using such weapons as democracy. General secretary Sally Hunt and others in the bureacracy walked out and halted the conference over calls for her to resign. Members are unhappy that she tried to push a dodgy deal during the pensions dispute.
Royal privileges
The Queen reportedly attacked striking miners at an aristocrat’s dinner party in the 1970s according to an interview with Tariq Ali. She said they were “holding the country to ransom”. She is alledgedly politically neutral so we won’t expect a letter. It is said her husband Prince Philip called for Arthur Scargill’s head to roll.
Trump’s trade tantrum
The US and its traditional allies are on the brink of a full-scale trade war after European and Canadian leaders reacted to Donald Trump’s decision to impose tariffs. The president of the European commission, Jean-Claude Juncker, promised immediate retaliation after the US said on 31 May that EU companies would face a 25 percent duty on steel.
Not everyone’s taste
The June issue of Catholic Herald is out. It’s front page screams “Ireland has fallen” and has a picture of the Grim Reaper casting a long shadow over the island. See our feature on the struggle for abortion rights for why.
Climb for citizenship
In France, a Malian migrant was given citizenship for scaling a building and saving a four year old’s life. That didn’t stop the state clearing more than a thousand migrants and refugees from one of the largest makeshift camps in Paris days later.
In November of last year, there was a brief moment of light amid the darkness that was 2020. Scotland became the first country in the world to make period products free for all. Just as the weekend and the eight-hour-day are now regarded by many as a given, future generations may be in disbelief that...
On 4 November last year, when many of us were watching the aftermath of the American presidential election, the US formally left the Paris Climate Agreement. Written in 2015 at the United Nations’ COP21 climate conference in Paris, the agreement is often considered to be the most significant document of international climate cooperation. Back then,...
To say 2020 was dramatic would be an understatement. The world situation has been completely transformed by the Covid-19 pandemic and the inadequacy of governmental and state responses. As we head into 2021 it feels like we are entering uncharted territory. To make specific predictions would be unwise. But the Covid-19 crisis raises fundamental questions...
The 2020 crisis we’ve endured isn’t an aberration of the system but, as Alex Callinicos argues, an aspect of its permanent crisis.
